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Talk:Archibald Wavell, 1st Earl Wavell
I'm afraid someone else will have to upload the picture. Technical difficulties are keeping me from snagging one off the Net. Should be easy to find. :Never mind, it's working now. Turtle Fan (talk) 02:06, August 2, 2012 (UTC) CdE's first historical figure. Turtle Fan (talk) 02:05, August 2, 2012 (UTC) Spoiler Heavy Rant Walsh's first scene has him brag to one of Wilson's goons that a coup's a-comin'. His second has him ask Wavell to lead it, and Wavell responds with a wishy-washy no. In Walsh's third scene he gets arrested, and in the next scene Jezek's trying to find someone who reads enough Spanish to translate a newspaper article on unrest in England--England, not Britain or the UK, though to be generous I believe (not certain) that Lussophones use Ingleterra to mean all three. :My experience with Lussophones bares that out. The name "Reindo Unido" does exist, but Ingleterra was the name used in my Spanish classes. Actually, to be further generous, I can remember people in my lifetime using "England", "Britain", and "UK" interchangeably. They were usually of the same generation as HT. (See also: "Russia" and "USSR"; "America" and "United States"TR (talk) 14:56, August 2, 2012 (UTC) ::It's still a common practice. And lately, a growing pet peeve of mine. . . . Turtle Fan (talk) 17:22, August 2, 2012 (UTC) In Walsh's fourth scene the goons are mistreating him, then all of a sudden "the major"--dude doesn't even get a name, and not in a "We don't tell each other our names in case we're captured" kind of way, either--breaks into the jail, springs Walsh, and says everything's taken care of. Then in the next scene Mouradian is flying on a mission to help the English soldiers--not Brits, though he specifically says to look for Union Jacks rather than St George's Crosses; not sure what the country's Russian name(s) is/are--to safety so they can fight the Germans, even though the major told Walsh the troops were holding in place and staying neutral till a new Parliament could be elected and a new Cabinet could decide who the real enemy is. :From skimming, my impression is that the Soviets were assisting the British in returning to the UK. Then they could decide, with the French, to open up the Western Front again on French soil. A scene a little later has Lemp hunting troop ships carrying British soldiers so they definitely didn't join the Soviets in attacking the Germans. It may have been the intention to hold in place but the authorities realized it wouldn't be safe to do so. ML4E (talk) 23:58, August 2, 2012 (UTC) ::I don't believe HT retcons why the Brits didn't hold in place, but something I read earlier does sort of suggest that once the military took over, they found the temptation to go to war with Germany right away was overwhelming. As for the French, there's not much sign of them switching back yet, though if Harcourt's squad is a representative sampling, there'd be significant minority support. In a later Walsh scene, he worries Hitler may twist Daladier's arm into attacking Britain while he's too busy to do it himself. Turtle Fan (talk) 03:13, August 3, 2012 (UTC) That's all, and it's played out within the first third of the book. Despite the fact that the entire novel is named for it. Beria's out-of-nowhere attempt to overthrow Molotov in Col got almost as much coverage. That's what we spent all winter eagerly awaiting. :Wow. No wonder I couldn't get much of a read in those preview pages. So do they actually have elections? That could be a plot point later. Maybe....TR (talk) 14:56, August 2, 2012 (UTC) ::I haven't read far enough to see what happens with the elections yet, but I don't imagine that the blink-and-you'll-miss-it coup would be anywhere close to traumatic enough to make a general election at all problematic. The Tories will have to get their leadership ironed out pretty quick. Turtle Fan (talk) 17:22, August 2, 2012 (UTC) :::** Spoiler Alert, Spoiler Alert** no elections by the end of the book as far as I could see, they had been postponed several times. ML4E (talk) 23:58, August 2, 2012 (UTC) ::::Well that's disappointing. I can see why, the military government appears to be massively unpopular. I'm starting to get the impression of the military very reluctantly slipping into dictatorship of necessity. Walsh does mention that the papers are flat-out libeling them, and getting away with it because the new government dare not give any sign of curtailing civil liberties. Turtle Fan (talk) 03:13, August 3, 2012 (UTC) Wavell's an odd choice too. He didn't serve on the General Staff at all during WWII. He was already in the Middle East before the real POD happened, and he wasn't all that distinguished there, either. His men got the Italians out of Ethiopia, but he wasn't field commander at either of those battles. He was field commander when Rommel sent him packing. He tried and failed to relieve Percival at Singapore, and the Japs took Burma on his watch, though again, he wasn't directly involved in the key actions. He really wasn't as bad as the record makes him look, but Churchill made him Viceroy (where he oversaw a quick and effective disaster relief operation to nip a Bengali famine in the bud) as a face-saving move rather than putting him out to pasture. Atlee, who had no respect for him, did put him out to pasture at the first opportunity. Nothing there makes him the obvious choice to topple Wilson, aside from the fact that he was right there--and without HT's unexplained butterfly effect, he wasn't even that! :The OTL part of the article you did says he was posted to the Middle East a few weeks before WW II broke out. That would be August, 1939, a year later than the invasion of Czechoslovakia, the "real" POD. ML4E (talk) 23:58, August 2, 2012 (UTC) ::July of '39. I must be getting my timelines crossed. In '38 he was a corps commander stationed near Andover. Turtle Fan (talk) 03:13, August 3, 2012 (UTC) As for the royals, they didn't play any role at all. They were obviously relieved that Wilson was gone, and though HT didn't say it, George certainly legitimated the coup. The major said there'd be a new election, and in those days that couldn't happen without the monarch calling for one. I'm guessing George also formally dismissed Wilson, though HT didn't give us enough to say for sure. The Army may have forced Wilson to tender his resignation, or maybe they're all just ignoring him altogether. At least we get to write an article on the Queen Mum? Turtle Fan (talk) 09:15, August 2, 2012 (UTC) :Three chears for the Queen Mum: hip, hip ... ML4E (talk) 23:58, August 2, 2012 (UTC) ::Hooray!Turtle Fan (talk) 03:13, August 3, 2012 (UTC)